“… One of the most distressing aspects of our time is the total destruction of one’s consciousness of everything that is connected to a conscious perception of the beautiful,” says Andrei Tarkowski.
For this young couple’s residence, the desire for a subtle confrontation with the site was the most important aspect of the design. This confrontation occurs in both directions, one of which is parallel to the lot due to the diagonal slope of the topography.
Thus arises the figure of a regulating square, which expands to the perpendicular line at the front of the lot, and arrives at an axis at the diagonal of the contours. The effect achieved is one of slowly loosening the house from the ground; thereby setting the intimate area on the ground floor and creating columns on the lower floor.
The difficult context of the sensitive landscape is articulated by the square that orients the home for the best sunlight and views, seeking to not set the walls, and setting different scales of spaces.
We also inverted the logic of the traditional layout that consists of a social hall, living room, dining room, balcony, and entertainment area, opting for an arrival on the axis that leads to the core of the house, which is the kitchen. The kitchen is in front of the balcony with the dining room to the right and the office to the left, integrating the collective life of the house as had been suggested by the owner, so he could see and be seen from the leisure and social areas.
Working with the client’s intelligent and open preferences, we made an intimate area by changing high ceilings in almost every room with an open slit that allows natural lighting and cross ventilation. This oblique tear articulates different functions that require natural lighting and ventilation, which is opposed to the necessary privacy and light control in bedrooms. Thus, it lights the couple’s closet, as well as lights and ventilates the daughter’s suite and the office.
In this zigzag that turns the body of the house, we articulated a wooden deck that makes the transition from social functions to the leisure area. The ground at the ground level is now cut, working with embankments that end up in a swimming pool not yet built, and further on to the small forest on a nearby stream. The use of stone and concrete materials makes an assertive boundary between the built and the natural.
In these moments of intimacy in the house, through the successive descents into the ground; and in the horizontal landscape, the vast plateau, and the small mountain front, the viewer makes his or her spaces, deciding which scale to seek according to his or her mood.
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